Tropical Storm Debby hit Florida with catastrophic flooding and was blamed for at least four deaths, with Georgia and South Carolina next in line as the system rips across the south-eastern United States.
Record-setting rain was forecast to cause flash flooding in coastal Georgia and South Carolina, and into North Carolina, with up to 30 inches of rainfall in some areas, the National Hurricane Centre said.
Debby made landfall early on Monday as a Category 1 hurricane over the gulf coast of Florida.
The tropical storm was moving slowly, covering roads with water and contributing to at least four deaths.
A lorry driver died on Interstate 75 in the Tampa area after he lost control of his trailer, which flipped over a concrete wall and dangled over the edge before the cab dropped into the water below.
Sheriff’s office divers found the driver, a 64-year-old man from Mississippi, in the cab 40 feet below the surface, according to the Florida highway patrol.
A 13-year-old boy died on Monday after a tree fell on a mobile home, according to the Levy County sheriff’s office.
And in Dixie County, just east of where the storm made landfall, a 38-year-old woman and a 12-year-old boy died in a car crash on wet roads on Sunday. The Florida Highway Patrol said a 14-year-old boy who was a passenger had serious injuries.
More than 300,000 customers remained without power in Florida and Georgia on Monday, down from a peak of more than 350,000, according to PowerOutage.us and Georgia Electric Membership Corp.
Tropical Storm #Debby Advisory 13A: Debby Moving Over Northern Florida. Severe Flooding Expected Over the Southeastern United States For the Next Several Days. https://t.co/tW4KeGe9uJ
— National Hurricane Center (@NHC_Atlantic) August 5, 2024
Florida governor Ron DeSantis said some 17,000 people were working to restore electricity. He told residents to sit tight until conditions are safe.
“When the water rises, when you have streets that can be flooded, that’s hazardous,” Mr DeSantis said. “Don’t try to drive through this. We don’t want to see traffic fatalities adding up.”
Airports were also affected. More than 1,600 flights had been cancelled nationwide, many of them to and from Florida airports, according to FlightAware.com.
One out of every five flights scheduled to leave Orlando International Airport was cancelled on Monday. Nearly 30% of flights scheduled to leave Tampa International Airport were cancelled.
Sarasota, Florida, a beach city popular with tourists, was one of the hardest hit by flooding.
“Essentially we’ve had twice the amount of the rain that was predicted for us to have,” said Sarasota County fire chief David Rathbun in a social media update.
The storm made landfall early Monday near Steinhatchee, Taylor County, a tiny community in northern Florida of fewer than 1,000 residents.
Several roads were closed because of flooding, sheriff Wayne Padgett said. Trees and power lines had also fallen across some roads.
President Joe Biden was briefed on Debby’s progress at his home in Wilmington, Delaware, the White House said.
Vice President Kamala Harris has postponed a scheduled trip to Georgia.
In South Carolina, Charleston County interim emergency director Ben Webster called Debby a “historic and potentially unprecedented event” three times in a 90-second briefing on Monday.
The city of Charleston has an emergency plan in place that includes sandbags for residents, opening parking garages so residents can park their cars above floodwaters and an online mapping system that shows which roads are closed.
North Carolina and South Carolina have dealt with three catastrophic floods from tropical systems in the past nine years.